Cannes 2026 | Payal Kapadia To Serve As Jury President For 65th Cannes Critics’ Week

Indian filmmaker Payal Kapadia, who won the Grand Prix at Cannes in 2024 for All We Imagine as Light, will serve as the jury president for the 65th Cannes Critics’ Week (Semaine de la Critique), running alongside the main festival from May 13 to 21, 2026.

Canadian actor Théodore Pellerin, French singer-songwriter Oklou, Ghanaian-British producer Ama Ampadu and journalist and Bangkok World Film Festival director Donsaron Kovitvanitcha will join Kapadia on the jury.

Kapadia, alongside her jury, will decide the winners of the La Semaine de la Critique Ami Paris Grand Prize for best feature, the Louis Roederer Foundation Rising Star Award for best actor or actress, and the Sony Discovery Prize for best short film.

“My own journey as a filmmaker was supported early on because of film festival selections. Through these I had the opportunity to meet others like myself from across the world and helped me build a community of future collaborators,” said Kapadia, per Deadline.

“At a time where independent cinema is being eroded in every country, supporting the first works of filmmakers is almost a resistance to the market forces. Film criticism is one of the key components of the independent and art house film ecosystem. The first films are often freer, more daring and fearless, having an individual voice and to champion those is absolutely essential. First films are also fragile and to be nurtured in a section like Critics Week, helps them blossom amongst already established filmmaker’s work.”

In 2025, Kapadia joined the prestigious jury at the 78th edition of the Cannes film festival.

Kapadia's short films Afternoon Clouds and And What is the Summer Saying were selected at the Cinéfondation and the Berlinale. Her first feature documentary, A Night of Knowing Nothing, was selected at the Directors’ Fortnight in 2021 and won L’Oeil d’Or for Best Documentary.